Tamen Negara was a confusing place to visit. We had a struggle figuring out where to stay which was cheap an easy to move onto Kuala Lumpur from. So, after alot of annoyingly confusing research i figured out that the bus drops us off from the cameron highlands and leaves to KL from a place called Jeruntut. This place also seemed cheaper (the hotels at the national park are quite pricey) and easy(ish) to get to the national park from. So, we booked a £3/£1.50 each a night hotel (there is only 2 hotels in this town) and decided to brave the public buses to try and get to the national park as the tour agents were charging a 35 ringit boat to the park (public buses were only 7 and quicker).
Our hotel, was as expected for £1.50 each, amazing. Joking, it was the hottest room ever, no bed sheets, a horrible obviously not washed mattress and the bathroom is a another story and i dont even mention the hobo next door. But we survived one night and we were only planning to stay one night as we left for Kuala Lumpur the next day.
We had a bit of a mare the morning after our 'lovely' nights sleep or a blessing in disguise as it meant less time in the horrid hotel. We pre-prepared our public bus journey to Tamen Negara the day before by getting the timetable from the bus stop man. As we were planning to get that evening bus to Kuala Lumpur we knew we'd have to blitz through the national park and get back in time for the bus. The bus stop man told us to get to the bus stop at 6:30am for the 7am bus. We got up at 5:45am, quickly packed and left our bags in the hotel lobby (we took our passports with us, as this hotel has no security). It's still dark and no one is at the bus stop except the taxi drivers telling us the bus doesn't come until 8am, not knowing what to believe we sat there until finally a lady comes along selling bus tickets to Tamen Negara. The bus didnt come until 8am but it was quicker then expected and cheap. We had planned to get the 3pm bus back to jeruntut from tamen negara to catch the 5pm bus to Kuala Lumpur. Alot of planning was riding on the public transport so we hoped our 'cheap' way of doing the national park would pay off.
We made it back to the village where the bus stop is in good time, so we grabbed some lunch and waited for the bus to arrive. We were approached by a man in a mini van asking if we were going back to jerantut. He said he could take us in his mini van for 7 ringit and it was a lot quicker then the public bus so we decided to go in the mini van so we have time to shower before our bus to KL.
We made it back for 3:30pm and quickly grabbed a free shower in the crappy hotel. The receptionist offered us the ground floor bathroom and it was so gross it made me gag so i ran up to the next floor to use that shower, the ceiling was falling off so i had to search for another bathroom. Cj, braved the ground floor bathroom and drip dried so he didn't have to carry his wet towel. Lol!
So, after all this cuffuffle we arrived at the bus stop again, ready for the 5pm bus to Kuala Lumpur. Of course, we are told the bus doeant get here until 6:30pm so we bought our tickets and decided to give in and head to KFC to drown our tiredness in chicken.
And finally, i am writing this whilst on the bus to Kuala Lumpur. Hurray! I have no idea how i am still awake after being up 14 hours with a crappy nights sleep in the worst hotel, having trekked through a jungle and up a huge hill. But we successfully managed to do tamen negara on the cheap with tight timing and we didn't have to stay in that hotel for 2 nights which was what we desperately didn't want to end up doing.
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